Telescopic hot sticks are typically used in a high voltage electrical environment as well as other environments where a long reach is needed to access a workpiece located at a remote location, such as on a power pole or the like. Hot sticks are typically constructed of a suitable dielectric material and include a tool holder at an extremity thereof. The tool holder is adaptable to engage a wide array of different tools or the like. One such hot stick is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,593,196, the entirety of the disclosure in this patent being incorporated herein by reference.
The hot stick disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,593,196 allows a user to perform a wide variety of tasks such as opening and closing various types of switches, replacing fuses, pruning tree limbs or replacing lamps in street circuits and rooms with high ceilings. Since the workpiece may be as far as 30 feet or more away from a user, the telescoping hot stick or pole provide a variable length to accommodate these tasks.
One of the issues that arises when the user wishes to extend or collapse the pole sections is that when a digit on the user's hand is used to depress a button on the locking assembly into the button receiving aperture to move the top surface of the button to a location inside of the inner surface of the outer pole section, sometimes the digit moves the top surface of the button to a position below the outer surface of the inner pole section resulting in the digit on the user's hand becoming pinched between the outer surface of the inner pole section and the inner surface of the outer pole section. When the user's hand is covered by a glove, the material of the glove can become caught in the pinch zone.
Accordingly, it is a purpose of this invention to provide a telescoping pole assembly which includes a pole locking assembly having a pinch safety feature for preventing the digit on the user's hand or the material of the user's glove from becoming pinched between to two mutually adjacent telescoped poles.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a telescoping pole assembly wherein the pinch safety feature allows the top surface of the button to be moved from a location radially outside the outer pole section inwardly through the button receiving aperture to a location just inside the inner surface of the outer pole section against a resistance provided by a first elastically yieldable member and against a resiliently yieldable stop. Continued movement of the button radially inwardly can only be continued by the use of a tool or an excessive hand force. This continued movement is against the resistance provided by the first elastically yieldable member combined with the resistance provided by the yieldable stop in the form of a second elastically yieldable member is important for initial assembly purposes to allow a radially inward movement of the top surface of the button to a location radially inside of the inner surface of the inner pole section to enable the locking assembly to be initially inserted into the interior of the inner pole section.